Page:Islam, Turkey, and Armenia, and How They Happened.djvu/25

 the opportunity to examine the very fine pages and richly ornamented covers while the white-turbaned guide was busy in telling stories about the out-of-order "golden clock," which was presented to a previous Sultan by the Emperor Napoleon, and the heavy embroidered green curtains used many years in the "Sacred Kabeh," and forwarded to him as a compliment to his religious zeal; and the chest in which "the sacred beard" of the Prophet is still preserved, which no one is allowed to open but the Sultan himself when he comes to kiss the sacred relics kept in that magnificent shrine of white marbles.

Such a book of boundless mysteries and rich blessings can never be translated into other languages; hence the Arabs, the HindoosHindus [sic], the Moors, the Persians, the Turks and the Albanians, all different races with different dialects, read it in the same original Arabic language with the strictest care of correct articulation. A great many learned people make it their life work to commit the whole Koran (a book about the size of the New Testament) to memory and rehearse it continually. Even the majority of the blind men among Mohametans learn the whole book by heart, and on various occasions are invited into the Harems to rehearse certain portions for their own interest and for the benefit of the household. They are called "Hafiz," the Preserver (of the ancient Word).

It is not an unusual thing to see a pious Mohametan sit before the window of his house, or even at his